HUD’s efforts to end housing support for mixed-status families will ruin lives

I moved into Section 8 housing with my father in 2008 while attending Loyola University Chicago. Without the apartment provided by the housing voucher program, finishing college would have been impossible. 

My parents separated when I was young, and I grew up with my mother. Living with her while in college would have required a two-hour commute to campus. My father, a disabled immigrant from Guatemala, offered another option: a Section 8 apartment on Chicago’s Northwest Side, 45 minutes by bus and train. We overlooked an alleyway above Mexican bakeries, a neighborhood produce market, and an abandoned Jewel Osco supermarket. It was the first time I lived with my dad, and the apartment provided the stability necessary to earn my degree.

This pivotal experience accessing federally assisted housing wasn’t unique. In the U.S. millions of low-income families, elderly people, and individuals with disabilities rely on federal housing assistance— including mixed-status immigrant households. Current regulations allow mixed-status families to receive limited assistance based on the number of household members with legal immigration status in the U.S.  

But soon, this lifeline may come to an end for some of the people who need it the most. 

In February, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) proposed a rule that would shatter the stability that federal housing assistance has long provided to mixed-status families. The rule would ban mixed-status families from accessing public and subsidized housing, and require all family members to verify their citizenship or legal immigration status in order to receive housing. This would force households to choose between separating from each other or losing access to housing assistance altogether.

The Trump administration has framed the proposal as an effort to strip housing from immigrants, though, according to HUD’s own analyses, fewer than 1% of all households receiving federal rental aid are mixed-status families. The real goal, it seems, is to scare mixed-status families with the message that lawfully accessing public assistance is a risk. 

More broadly, HUD Secretary Scott Turner has tried to reinforce the discriminatory and false notion that immigrants without legal status are not taxpayers and that government support creates dependence, rather than serving as a foundation for security and opportunity. My own experience illustrates how the housing program can provide the stability needed to accomplish larger goals, such as finishing college and building a career.

Given the Trump administration’s larger, anti-immigrant agenda, it’s clear the proposed rule change is intended to create a broader chilling effect. Mixed-status families will likely avoid applying for assistance because doing so would expose undocumented family members and increase the threat of detention and deportation. Proposals that tie benefits such as housing stability to citizenship verification will discourage families from engaging with public programs and benefits they are entitled to.

Rather than fighting xenophobic federal policies, some states are embracing them. For example, Louisiana’s Acts 419 and 351 aim to expand the practice of collecting immigration-related data within public systems. 

Act 419 requires state agencies—including the Department of Education, public universities, Corrections, and Children and Family Services—to collect immigration data from individuals receiving public services and to publicly report the cost of providing these services to undocumented immigrants. Act 351 mandates state agencies administering public assistance programs, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and Medicaid, to collect personal information from ineligible applicants and share that data with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). 

These efforts are not new. In 1994, California voters approved Proposition 187, which sought to deny undocumented immigrants access to public services and required educators and healthcare workers to report suspected undocumented immigrants to authorities. While courts ultimately blocked the unconstitutional measure, its legacy continues. 

For decades, the broader goal of anti-immigrant policies has been to make the U.S. so inhospitable that immigrants choose to leave or refrain from migrating at all. This approach only illustrates how little elected officials understand the determination of our communities.  

As just one example, I volunteer with Maya Mam immigrants in Oakland, California, as they prepare for their citizenship interviews. These Indigenous families from Guatemala are used to operating in adverse environments. For instance, many students come from multilingual households: Parents speak Mam, one of the 22 officially recognized Mayan languages spoken in Guatemala, and the children speak both Mam and Spanish, while local schools communicate primarily in English. As court dates loomed for these immigrants, several adult students told me that they would continue to attend their hearings despite widespread reports of immigration enforcement near courthouses. If they were detained, they said, so be it. 

What stood out was not fearlessness, but the degree to which uncertainty had become a condition of daily life. Family members accompanied one another to appointments, shared information, and navigated systems collectively. Because, you see, their lives revolve around family bonds, not the threat of immigration enforcement or tidy eligibility categories that seek to separate them.

The expectation that families would divide themselves to preserve access to housing assistance ignores the limitations of fear and the strength of family bonds.

The expectation that families would divide themselves to preserve access to housing assistance ignores the limitations of fear and the strength of family bonds. The proposed HUD rule echoes bipartisan border deterrence logic that presumes that Border Patrol’s state-sanctioned strategy to push migrants deeper into the harsh desert borderlands will deter movement. In reality, it only forces migrants to risk their lives by taking more dangerous paths to the U.S.

Evictions resulting from HUD’s proposal could also lead to new forms of criminalization and family separation. ICE could be deployed to help carry out evictions, for example, or lead agencies to accuse undocumented parents of being unable to care for their American citizen children, thus triggering various forms of family separation. 

The rule could also have other cascading consequences. For example, immigrant parents may be forced to accept longer work hours, multiple jobs, lower wages, and more dangerous working conditions to cover higher rents. Children could face housing instability, disrupted schooling, and fewer educational opportunities. With more limited housing options for immigrant families, landlords could begin to collect even higher rents. 

The result would be a system that shifts housing costs onto low-income families while increasing their economic vulnerability. Rather than reducing dependence, HUD’s rule would trap households in a vicious cycle where their increased labor only produces more insecurity and instability. 

The apartment I shared with my father enabled my upward mobility and contributions to my community. The policies proposed by the Trump administration and HUD not only undermine housing stability and close doors for families today; they also close doors on the brighter futures that mixed-status families are trying to build.

Editorial Team:
Tina Vasquez, Lead Editor
Sahar Fatima, Top Editor
Rashmee Kumar, Copy Editor